Three Simple Words
by Luke Forge
Summary: The tragedy of two nameless players. Just one of the many sacrifices from the scouting teams who took on the most dangerous job in the game, the mapping of the dungeons and scouting for the boss room. A tribute to the many that died working towards our freedom from this cursed game.


I couldn't believe it, this wasn't happening.

I looked over to my commander; she was already organizing a controlled retreat as the door behind us started descending. Slow enough to give people hope of escape, but fast enough that not everyone would get there in time. I noticed the slight trembling of her hands, betraying her usual calm and collected demeanor.

She looked over to me, her knowledge of my abilities made me the first person she looked to for an escape plan, and I nodded back. The action seemed to reassure her, she knows I've never let her down before. I've made sure of that.

I dispatched a **Skeletal Warrior **with a quick **Horizontal**, it was one of the many that littered the room. The skeleton disintegrated into thousands of blue geometric shards, and by the time it was finished, I already had my inventory open, and had unequipped my sword.

She stood over me, covering me while I manipulated my gear build. The familiar weight of my plate male vanished, nearly immediately replaced by comfortable, formfitting leather armor. And with a new weight in my left hand, I sprang into action.

My Mythril Tonfa intercepted a slash, protecting my forearm with the mystic metal. I shoved the monster back, and took off towards the door. My vision focused, piercing the chaos of the battle taking place arrowed me and fixating on the door. I noticed a crowd of players were retreating to the closing door in a panic, but I sped passed the group of STR based players easily.

I dove for the door, rolling out just as it became too narrow. Immediately I grabbed one of the key rings tethered to my side, chose one of the many picks and jammed it into the door frame.

The lock picking system in this game, like the cooking, was simplified. Sometimes doors didn't have keyholes; you just have to touch the picks to the door and one will form. Doors without keyholes required significantly more skill then doors with keyholes. But lock picking skills we're something I had in spades.

I seized the key ring tethered to the other side of my belt, selecting another key and similarly shoving it into the doorframe. The door stopped its descent with millimeters to spare.

Once a trap door seals the room itself disappears, disconnecting from the rest of the world until all inhabitants are either dead, or have eliminated all the monsters within. This particular dungeon apparently has a trap that lures players in by pretending to be the boss room.

'_Dangerous to scouting parties like us._' I noted. '_Damn, Kayaba you've thought of everything haven't you…_'

I focused back to the task at hand. I've stopped the dissent of the door, barely, but now I have to get it to open again… I pulled out the lock pick in my right hand and twirled the key ring around my finger, selecting another pick and jammed it back into the wall giving it a twist.

I sighed. That should give me a few moments.

Unlatching the pick from the key ring, I laid out the rest of my picks on the floor. I quickly shuffled through my assortment, pausing only to grab a handful of select picks, one with a sharp triangle tip, another with a figure eight on the end, and the last with a couple blunt teeth. Forcing the figure eight into the wall while untwisting the previous key, the other payers had finally caught up if the panicked pounding on the door was anything to go by anyway.

I shoved the next key into the door and twisted.

***Click* **I'm in.

I smirked as I plug in another key and twisted. The door groaned in protest, but begrudgingly started opening again. It made it to about half way up before relieved players started crawling, diving, and rolling out. As the door opened wider, the screams of panic and shouts of relief could be heard more and more clearly.

I glanced back, smiling as I counted the people that were now chugging health potions and embracing each other, thankful to still be alive. My smile faded as I realized there were only 27 of them and a distinct lack of the forest green and dulled brown of my Guild. I leaned over from my kneeling position, still keeping the door open with my keys, to get a peek inside.

That's when I noticed the sounds of fighting hadn't stopped.

Still inside the trap room, my party members were covering the wounded's escape, the large mob of skeletons clashing against the retreating half circle of my guild. I glanced at the party list on my HUD; every single listed player was in yellow, some teetering into the red. I tried yelling at them, but no noise came from my throat.

'_Damn! Stupid armor set_._'_ My current leather armor, the 'Phantom Step' set, erases all user-made noise making it ideal for sneaking around places. Downside, something that I've only recently started noticing, is that I can't communicate very well with the rest of my party.

I watched in wordless horror as my party members were slowly whittled down by the unreal mass of undead. And that's when I heard it.

It started as a low whine, and then steadily grew to a moderate protest. Soon it was the shrieking sounds of steel girders warping under stress. I stared at the picks sticking out of the door frame; they were shaking and heating up in my hands as the trap started resisting my hostile takeover.

'_What!?_' I screamed in my head as I watched my keys grow cracks. I sat there staring in fright until the shattering of a key brought me back from my shock. I glanced at the door, it had begun to force its way close, grating against the influence of my keys.

Another shattered.

I hastily grabbed my key rings, forcing 4 more picks into the wall, panicking as the last of the originally inserted keys broke into fragments. Turning the picks to varying degrees and watching in wonder as they slowly started untwisting themselves. I grabbed one and tried setting it back, only to have it continue turning like I wasn't even there.

The other players had noticed the sound and looked over to my directing curious. Seeing me in my panicked state made them rush over to see what's wrong. They saw me struggling to turn back the keys as they forced themselves back to a vertical angle and were slowly pushed from the wall.

I turned back to one, selecting someone with heavy armor, grabbing him by the collar of his breastplate and pulled him in close. Grabbing his arm I tried to use his hand to turn one of the picks. After a second he caught on.

"Hay! We need help here!" He shouted to get everyone attention. "Help me hold these keys in place!" Two guys in bulky armor rushed over, and each grabbing a key and started struggling to turn them back.

With 3 STR based players struggling to hold the keys, the door slowed exponentially, leaving only 3 feet of open space under it. I backed up, no longer actually helping with my presence.

I looked into the room to check the progress of my retreating party; several players had broken the formation and sprinted out as their health was too low to help much longer.

I saw her. She was at the apex of the semicircle. Barking orders and holding off the mob of skeletons with wide, powerful swings of her huge blade. But even with her offensive style of fighting, her health was dropping every now and then from stray hits.

I charged in, ducking under the stalled door, and sprinted to the formation. I leaped over the wall of players, over her, and landed on top of a skeleton. I collided feet first into the rib cage of the thing. Knocking it to the ground and smashing my Tonfa through its skull with **Heavy Impact**. This got the attention of the nearby enemies.

I was smack dab in the middle of the hoard, I was a distraction.

The monsters attacking my party turned to face the new threat, only to be cut down from behind by the players they were just facing.

She got the hint.

"EVERYBODY FALL BACK!" She shouted. Everyone in the formation quickly finished off their opponents and started sprinting to the stalled door.

'Definitely not my best plan.' I thought as I blocked an overhead slash with my tonfa, and retaliated with a **Jab**. Only to use the momentum of the punch to spin into a **Tornado Kick** knocking back the skeleton behind me. I then dropped low to avoid a green glowing ax aiming to cleave my head off.

Many players were under the impression that Martial Skills could only be used if you were completely unarmed. This is somewhat true however I discovered you could in fact use them as long as your Main hand was void of equipment. There were no rules about secondary hands.

Instinctively I threw out an elbow behind me, only to have it blocked and a large sword swung at me. I twisted, bringing down my left arm and the tonfa in it to intercept the strike and braced myself for the impact.

***Clang***

I blinked. The sword met tonfa alright, but it was the sword that shocked me. I glanced to the wielder and nearly tripped. **_SHE was HERE!_** It took me a second to realize I attacked her on reflex, and she retaliated without thinking. She removed her blade from my tonfa to swing at another skeleton. I just gapped, why was she still here? She gave the order to retreat herself! My musing was rewarded with a sword threw my back.

I turned quickly, ripping the blade out of the skeleton's hands and threw a 4 punch combo, ending with a **Haymaker**. The blade slid out of my torso, taking with it a large chunk of my health, bringing me to yellow. The moderate cool down of the skill wearing off just in time for me to block another glowing blade.

I glanced back to the door, happy to see it still open to about two and a half feet. I swung my tonfa in a wide arc, forcing the undead horde to take a step back. I leaped back towards her, retreating until we were back to back.

She was panting and a quick glance at my HUD told me she was running low on health.

Block. Duck. Swing. Punch. Dodge. Kick.

I followed this pattern and similar variations until she raised her sword, glowing red.

"Get down!" She screamed as she brought down her blade in a wide 360. I crouched low as the glowing weapon glided over me cleaving the skeletons around us in two. Once the Glowing of her sword faded, she slumped down.

I shoved her back before a mace could make contact with her. **Spiral Slash **has a ridiculous cool down, and it was my job to keep her alive during it. I used the temporarily open space to start ushering her to the door, which translated into pressing my back into her pushing her along though the cool down, and blocking the attacks that came from my side as her's was now clear. After 20 seconds she downed a health potion, and turned to once again face the skeletons. With the two of us now retreating, we started making some real progress towards the door.

Mid-block, I chanced a look back to see the door had dropped another half foot during our fight, I also noticed we we're the last ones in the room. Focusing back on the enemy trying to push me off balance, I dropped into a crouch and used **Spear Hand** on his sternum, a weak point on skeletal monsters.

Taking the critical hit, the monster dissolved into blue shards and I was once again engaging another skeleton that took its place. I refrained from using any more Sword or Martial Skills, deciding to save them for a crucial moment.

Once we made it to about 10 feet from the door I made my move. Shoving my current opponent to the side, I activated a Martial Skill, **Panic Kick**. I let go, the system taking over my movements once I selected a target. My body moved, taking a step to the side and twisting, my kick connected nearly immediately with my target. But it wasn't any of the skeletons.

**Panic Kick** named for its tendency to be reflexively called on in a panic. It's a simple maneuver with its low damage and high knock back, and it was designed to be used to disengage an opponent quickly by knocking them back a few meters. I had other ideas for it.

The look on her face, the total shock expressed there as my kick connected solidly to her stomach. The split second where the physics engine compared the inertia of her torso with that of my leg, before substituting in the knock back assigned to the Skill, we held eye contact. Time slowed for the both of us, the shocked and questioning expression locked on her face met the soft smile on mine. In that moment I told her three words. Three simple words.

Then before she could even process their meaning, time caught up with us again, and she was launched in a shallow arc towards the door. Hitting the ground and tumbling a few times, she slid to a stop halfway through the slowly closing door, it now barley 15 inches off the ground, straining to crush the influence of my keys and trap as many players as it still could.

I watched as she tried to glance back at me but was pulled through from the other side of the door. The soft smile never leaving my face as I turned back to the raging mob of skeletons, tonfa raised and right fist glowing.

I felt lighter after getting that off my chest. It really felt good. Even as I took a **Horizontal** to the back while I blocked an over hand slash. Even when my tonfa shattered into blue shards after running out of durability, knocking me to the floor. Even when pinned to the ground with a sword in the shoulder, leg, torso, and wrist, it felt good. Because I finally did it. I finally told her. After all this time, all we've been through I finally gathered enough courage to admit it. The smile never left my face, even as I closed my eyes, the skeleton above me preparing the final strike. All because of those three simple words. My only regret was she never got to hear them, stupid armor set.


End file.
